


Violent Fondness

by Ticigi



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Alternate Universe - No Voldemort, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Blackcest (Harry Potter), Brother/Brother Incest, Dubcon Kissing, Implied Mpreg, M/M, Obsessive Behavior, Possessive Behavior, Pureblood Culture (Harry Potter), Sirius Black is a Little Shit, The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, dubcon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:49:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28250424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ticigi/pseuds/Ticigi
Summary: Sirius loves Regulus, so he searches for dominion.
Relationships: Orion Black/Walburga Black, Regulus Black/Sirius Black, Sirius Black & James Potter, Sirius Black & Remus Lupin & Peter Pettigrew & James Potter
Comments: 5
Kudos: 53





	Violent Fondness

**Author's Note:**

> If you skipped tags, this is a soulmate au, with no Voldy in picture. There's talk of mpreg, and very liberal position towards incest by Sirius and his family.
> 
> Update (03-08-21): edited to fix grammar mistakes

Before Regulus was born, grandmother Melania brought an old Greek seer to Grimmauld Place. The man, Sirius remembered, seemed one breath away from death, the oldest person he had ever met, and carried such a shade of frailty it made him look away several times during the short introduction, almost temerous for the unknown wizard, who was wearing pristine white robes and a lost gaze with his one functioning eye. The other, a uniform shade of blue and seemingly blind was the one, according to grandma, that could only see in other times, blinded only to the present. Mother, never one to care about divination, clearly didn’t want the bother of going to the garden facing the cold wind and watch as this opportunist, as she later put it, relied on teatrics to stare glassy-eyed at a bonfire and pretended to see beyond their plane of existence. 

Later, lounging in a comfortable seat by the fireplace of the sitting room, mother placed a hand on the small bump of her pregnant stomach watching the fire with a pensive gaze, before scoffing the prophecy with disdain upon father’s questioning. It was past his bedtime, but thankfully, his parents weren't paying much attention to this particular detail.

"Fate opened a very unusual path for the child. It will cause torment for the boy, but he shall not deviate from it as the end of his suffering will come in a burgeoning night when he devours the blood ties in a petal of life." 

There was disdain in the way mother spoke, but Sirius was under the impression that the word of this so-called opportunist was taken more seriously than she'd like to show.

On a hot summer night, after hours of endless pain, Regulus Arcturus Black was outed from his mother’s womb with a loud cry that covered all the nighttime incessant chirping for a few seconds and landed on the halway, where him, father and uncles Alphard and Cygnus stood, announcing his arrival before auntie Lucretia, the only one allowed in the room aside from father and the healers, could inform mother’s and the newest family member’s state.

He was three, and a jealous (albeith curious) older brother bursting in the room before anyone got the chance to grab his arm and discipline him for disobeying to check out his new rival for attention, lured by the loud sound of a new cry, so eager to see what came out of Mother's pained and scarily vulnerable cries that transpassed heavy wooden doors.

A few words of congratulation from uncle Alphard to his father upon the announcement of the birth of a healthy male offspring was the last thing he heard before turning the ornate door knob on his tiptoes and entering, caughting auntie Lu, who had just returned to the room, by surprise.

“I came to see my little brother,” he announced as proudly as possible, secretly worried he would be ousted from the room and smacked by father before he could get a glimpse of the baby and see if mother was fine.

Auntie Lucretia, indulgent as always, was holding a tiny form evolved by a light yellow baby blanket in her arms, and upon mother’s indisposition to mutter a coherent word, being cared for by a rather nervous healer, gestured for him to get closer and sat on a comfortable armchair and finally, he satiated his curiosity.

Regulus had his eyes closed very tightly, and all his skin was tinged with a rosy tone. He also didn’t look particularly clean, not bloody or anything but surely needing further cleaning. His head was covered with fine, damp dark hair, but perhaps the most distinctive about him was his utter frailty, in a certain way alike the old Greek seer’s in its nature, such a small and vulnerable figure drowned in yellow cotton. Sudden arm movements coaxed him to touch a tiny, balled up fist, but just as he was reaching it, little Regulus, with unexpected agility, caught his thumb first. Then it happened. The force. The feeling that magic was evolving both of them in a new connection. 

Sirius would forever remember the tremble running from his finger through the entirety of his body the moment Regulus’s newborn hand closed around it, the way all babies do, holding for life, with all strength and certainty their tiny, fragile hands could muster; the feeling that something in him changed,that something clicked in a way he didn’t know how to put in coherent thoughts lingering at the back of his – back then – infant mind. He remembered fully intending to call his baby brother ugly and gross in childish rage for losing his status of only child as a new little king in name was born, but the words lumped bitterly in a meaningless choking sound that died at his throat upon such an intense experience.

He shriveled, and Regulus’s face contorted to break in a tearless cry (he got curious and read about it later, found that, as a newborn, his baby brother was too young and too raw to the world for actual tears; those would come when his tiny body developed a little more), and mother, the one who had the moist of tears on her cheeks, much relieved for finally having given birth after several hours of incessant pained groans, sent him out to call father without giving him time to ask.

The worried glance auntie Lu sent his way as he headed to the door, and the tightening of her hold on Regulus didn’t pass unnoticed.

It wasn’t long before he found out why his little brother caused such an intense sensation. When aunt Lucretia and Mother were having cold drinks in the parlour, among their uninteresting gossip Sirius picked the word soulmate, which, most likely wasn’t the first time hearing the term, but the first he actually listed and later he asked their governess for the meaning of the word that sounded intriguing enough to caugh his very wandering attention long enough for the time alone with Miss Brown to come and the new term still be firmly caught in his thoughts.

“A soulmate is someone born with a very special connection, in your case, young master, should you have one, meant to be yours. Someone to be your pair, to accompany you through life. One's soulbound connection is generally felt upon physical contact in binding magic, and not everyone is fortunate enough to possess this gift. Most cases occur within the pureblood community, naturally,since it’s a magical bound, but not restricted to it. There are a few cases where the magic surrounding the bond is strong enough to leave a physical spot on the area of contact, but mostly, the pair involved just feels it. Also, the old magic involved allows for a link between the unconscious, and when one’s soulmate is in danger or in need of their other half, it is possible to feel their need physically or as intuition.” 

Felt upon physical contact.Regulus had that light shadow of a mark on his left hand, the hand which touched him, And him, a similar one, although way smaller, on his finger.

“So, like couples? Do soulmates have to marry each other?” He asked with startled eyes.

“Although strictly speaking, a soulbound does not require a betrothal, usually there’s no reason to oppose one. After all, someone hardly would turn away someone born to be compatible, connected in a way no one else could.”

Sirius considered asking if Miss Brown had a soulmate, but decided against it, after all, if she did, she surely wouldn't be living in their house. Plus, she was terribly rigid about Sirius asking personal questions.

Yuck , he thought back then. Couples. He didn’t want to marry Regulus . That would be gross.

If only his younger self knew how such thought was untrue, how much escaped his very limited comprehension, how shortly later he would yearn for a lifetime tied to his Reggie. How he would grow up and fall in love with his pouting and shy smiles and the way he yawned and stretched in bed in the mornings in an almost feline-resembling way. With his contained laugh, because Regulus’s happiness, restricted as it was, unleashed his own.

But Regulus thought differently from him.

Father and mother, upon realizing the bond, were not happy to say the least. By the time he was eight years old, he finally reacted to their constant reproach whenever the subject was brushed when Sirius took Reg’s little hand on his and caressed his palm with lingering fingertips, or drawed his lips in an innocent kiss on his baby brother’s forehead for too long for their liking. 

“Who are you to input your judgement over magic? Why such a fuss over Regulus being my soulmate? This is far from the first time a Black gets tied to another Black. You’re both soulmates, you should understand!” That was the first time he said it aloud, and a tingle surged on his finger, familiar and reassuring.

“While I’m certainly not against a Black marrying a Black, boy,” Orion informed, addressing Sirius in his most condescending tone, “I must object when said union involves two male offspring that could not give continuity to our lineage. Should one of you be born female, I would encourage the bond. But as it is, it is useless to follow a soulbound that will bring you no child. There are ways, I suppose, but achieving those would require a discipline you are incapable of.”

But Sirius was already set on fighting for what felt right. Besides, father really should know better than to practically challenge him into something. “So that is the root of the problem? An heir? You’ll see, father, I’ll find the solution, no matter how long it takes.”

Orion, of course, didn’t take his word seriously, and both mother and him waved the possibility away and filled Regulus’s head with poison to tear them apart as they grew, and though they couldn’t pull them apart, not after Sirius first got hold of him in their parents’ bedroom, his little brother seemed to accept a fate were they would end up following separate paths, that they would marry, not each other, but bethrote pureblood ladies, and their bound would end up being solely platonic love. 

As if he would ever allow anyone but his soulmate to carry his children. Or take anyone else’s hand in marriage. No, that was Regulus’s place, and no one else’s, whether his family liked it or not.

Sirius held faith, and even if not a single soul believed Regulus and he would be tied together, alone he searched, and hoped, and seeked for years for a miracle that would seal what he knew was meant to be. 

It drove his friends away.

James, a desperate chaser for a soulbound, incessantly followed Lily Evans, who successfully dodged his attempts for physical touch for years, only for discovering, upon finally grabbing her uncovered wrist, that she was not the one, despite the nearly obsessive drive of his firm beliefs. That being said, it wasn’t even clear if he actually had a soulmate.

Yet, James kept believing. 

Yet, he dared looking at Sirius as if his best friend was completely insane, with mild disgust on the corners of his mouth barely hidden, upon the revelation of Sirius’s soulmate.

Yet, James kept telling the wrongness of it, of how there must be a mistake.

Sirius had thought James would understand him when he confessed; after all, Prongs really went far into his schemings to conquer Evans – including a badly executed plan at blackmailing that went really wrong when Snivellus found out. Not that the girl herself couldn’t retaliate, because she certainly did give them a hard time for it. He thought Prongs would get that certain matters were above the firmly imputed line of acceptable by an outsider's perspective.

Soon, Peter and Remus held their own variations of that same gaze, as if there’s something wrong with his bond. Peter, he observed, managed to keep the closest to neutral, always one to avoid confrontation. Remus; Remus dared look at him with pity , and Sirius, in his hot temper, told him it wasn’t he who was worthy of being pitied and ended a friendship that had been a wrong glance away from being shattered since his confession.

They stopped looking directly at him, stopped talking to him, sitting next to him. 

Although it was a pity not to have access to the marauders map anymore – after all, as the older brother, he was behoved with taking care of Regulus, and he used to check it all the time, wondering what Reggie would be doing – It gave him even more free time to spend with his brother, and for his almost life-long research.

He graduated, and there was even more time.

Sometimes, Regulus would bless him by permitting the taste of his sweet mouth and the warmth of his body. But it was never quite enough, not while his soulmate was ready to leave him, not while his dear Regulus refused to open his everything, heart and soul ready for consumption.

What Sirius craved for was dominion. To pass the point where Regulus could even think of wanting to go back.

Regulus loved him, he knew, but not nearly enough. His love didn’t match Sirius’s, not while he’s ready to stop what they have. But he ought to learn to, when the time comes, for the time, Sirius’s would have to suffice. 

Sirius liked catching him by surprise, holding his smaller body, the perfect fit, and placing an open palm on his chest, where he would feel the frantic beatings of something desperate to be free from its cage.

Regulus always put the blame of his thumping heartbeat on the surprise factor. Sirius knew better, knew that opening the cage was his mission. And so, he kept seeking, kept hunting for the key to undo the lock of hesitancy.

One afternoon, with the background noise of the rain clashing with the woods and glasses of the house, he found a book. Nothing out of usual, really, because he was consuming all mother’s extensive potions manuals, the collections of charms healing-focused, so he could understand better about how magic was crafted to affect a person’s body; anything he could get his hands on that he suspected could have any mention of male bearers and even the antique grimoires that required special maneuvering – he heard grandpa Pollux proudly mentioning to Arcturus an ancestor from his branch that was particularly interested in alchemy and healing and made some innovative notes in her grimoires; as an unmarried witch that spend her life locked in a lab, Arcturus response was a jab at her marital status and a mention that on his branch too, there were scholastics dedicated to spellcraft and magic theory. 

But this time, he picked a tome from a collection of studies over lore and possible historical parallels; he slipped his fingers over the crispy, yellowed pages that smelled dusty and long unwanted, when he found something that picked his interest running his eyes over the index.

There was a tale of an enchanted land where life prevailed. Every plant, every animal prevailed for eternity surpassing the cycle of life. But nature has a price for everything, and to maintain equilibrium, the price for not perishing was of not being able to make new life, with the exception of a rare, single species of cactus: the Selenicereus grandiflorus , or the Queen of the Night. It’s allure resided on its vanilla-scent, in the rarity of its blossom, a spectacle to be watched only a single night per year, for only a few hours before the fateful wither, and most importantly, on its alleged properties of turning the impossible into a very real possibility in terms of blossoming life. A special type, belonging only to that place, with different tones and stronger magical properties found in the rare ones of the tangible world.

This special land would be a potioneer’s paradise: full of rare plants and animals holding its properties forever, making conservation substantially easy for some trickier plants. But this place, lost in time, was by many deemed to be folklore, and by a smaller part of the wizarding community considered to be true, as Sirius later found out, despite being nearly impossible to find. The tale consisted of a warlock who loved a sterile woman, and searched incessantly until he stumbled, almost by accident, easy as falling asleep after an exhaustive day, in this place due to the intense desire of his heart to make her dream of conceiving a child come true. The man spent long years inside the land, unstoppable in his search for this blossoming flower, for it had to be collected specifically on its blossom and by the hands of the one to take part in the conception.

The end of the story was tragic: the woman died months before the man went back to his home, his last smile, thriving for his finding, dying away with the sight of the empty rooms as he looked for her. Not standing the sight of the flower that teared his gaze away from his wife until her passing, the man gave the precious flower to a scholar who studied its properties and developed the most efficient fertility potion, and helped several who faced the same problems of the man and his deceased wife. A cautionary tale of how too much focus could blind you off important things. 

But life lessons weren’t what he was after, and Sirius, in his abundant hope, found in the tale a possible trail that might lead to something useful, and so sent a letter to grandmother to ask for contact information with the seer, the one who made the prophecy for Reggie, aware that, at that point, the man was mostly likely dead. Petal of life, the man had said. And it was enough for a flaming hope that the man might have more to speak on the subject, and a tingle on his finger. The notes under the tale were vague for what he needed, focusing mostly on theory of the properties of some plants mentioned and the much weaker fertility properties of the real Queen of the night.

To his surprise, she sent back a short note with a name and address, and a comment of how she consulted with the seer only about a month prior.

But before he could unravel parchment to write back to her, and another for the man asking for his availability, Sirius heard a knock, followed by his brother’s gentle voice at his door.

“Sirius? May I come in?”

“Sure, puppet.”

Regulus opened the door, walking ahead ang giving space for Kreacher, who entered behind carrying a tray with a tea and biscuits, in a set for two.

“I was wondering if you’re hungry. It’s been...uh, quite some time since you left your bedroom, and you weren’t present at lunch, so would you like to have tea? And if you don’t mind, I’d like to stay a little.”

“Yes, of course, love.” And turning to the small wrinkled being standing close to the door, all the sweetness coating his words gone, “You. Put the tray on the table and leave us.”

“Yes, Master Sirius,” the elf begrudgingly complied, full of resentment on his dark eyes and gruff voice.

Once they were left alone, because Regulus never defied his authority in the presence of others, always holding a soft spot for magical creatures, let himself frown at the cold treatment. 

“Why must you be so cruel to Kreacher?”

“Why must you treat that thing as a pet who prepares your bath and cleans your room? It’s just an elf, Reg, and for the record, it never liked me.”

“I wonder why that would be,” Regulus replied, deciding to drop the subject that every once in a while ressurged as repetitions of the same points, “But I didn’t come here to defend Kreacher from unfair treatment. There’s something I’d like to discuss with you.”

Sirius followed Regulus and took a seat facing him. “Go on.”

“Well, I noticed that lately you seem a bit isolated. At school, I didn’t see you around your friends for a couple months before your graduation, and now that we’re home, you barely leave your bedroom, and when you do, it’s a fast trip to the library, or grandpa’s library, and soon you’re back here, locked all the time.”

“Aw, is my baby brother worried? It’s alright, Reg, I’m just busy.”

Regulus ignored the provocation. “Busy with the same nonsense, I imagine.”

“Now, Reggie,” and his happy façade faltered just the tiniest bit, “It’s not very nice of you to belittle my efforts, don’t you think?”

“It’s not that I’m diminishing your hard work, it’s just...it’s been so long, I’m worried you’re getting too attached to an idea that is nearly impossible to accomplish.”

“Funny,” he took a bite of a biscuit to give himself time to try and control his rising anger and cover the cruel smirk making its way to his lips,“must be the angle, but you didn’t seem one bit worried when I put you on your knees last night. Nor over me in the bathtub this morning.”

Sirius saw his brother’s cheeks being graced by a beautiful flush. An embarrassed Regulus was one of his favourites views. His brother was supremely easy to embarass, a sign of his shy personality that turned reading him a bit easier as a rosy tone took over his face just like the petals of the cherry trees outside that changed from white to pastel pink – both a soft color on a softer surface, tempting for touch.

“That’s– our...encounters have nothing to do with the current discussion. If you’re going to resort to such provocations, my words are pointless,” he stood up, ready to leave, “now, if you excuse me–”

But Sirius wouldn't allow for him to go, not when Regulus was opening up about his concerns. “Wait,” so he too stood up and grabbed Regulus’s wrist, “I’m sorry, puppet. Stay, your words could never be pointless to me.” 

Regulus glanced worriedly to his wrist before recomposing himself and looking right into Sirius’s eyes. “Fine, but please cease with your mockeries.” He conceived, hesitantly, sitting back to his place. “As I was saying, isolation it’s a bit worrying, Siri, especially for you, who used to be always such a social person, always surrounded by others. Couldn’t you try to spend more time out? Even if it’s with those idiots from school.”

“I had a minor disagreement with Remus and James, but I think it’s time to let it go and make amendments, since you asked nicely.”

“That’s good, I mean, that you’ll try. And don’t try to fool me; I couldn’t convince you to pick your favorite tea instead of plain water. You never do anything I ask unless you actually intended to do regardless.” 

“Yeah, well, someone needs to give the first step,” he answered, despite not having any intention to reach for his former friends unless they do it first, “and you’re no one to talk, you do many things I disapprove of, even if my word should have authority over you as your older brother and heir apparent.”

“Oh no,” Regulus rolled his eyes, “are you talking about my friends again? Sirius, the fact that I have friends shouldn't be unreasonable to you.”

“I told you, it’s not the fact that you have friends, but who they are. You might name what you and those Slytherins have as friendship, but you know they wouldn’t spare a glance at you should you do anything that could make them look bad as the uptight little purists they are.”

Regulus delicately put his teacup back on the saucer and bit his lower lip. He had this habit when something upset him and he was trying to measure his words. Measure to make a harsher strike. “Wouldn’t spare a glance at me, you say?” He offered Sirius a sarcastic smile before biting, “You mean like those Gryffindors completely ignoring your existence in your last two months at Hogwarts for whatever you have done, after years of you favouring them over your own family, that put up with all your tantrums and general pleasure in turning everything difficult? Because whatever it was, it wasn’t aligned with their entitled and unintelligent views, since James Potter seems to majorly influence those other two and has to be the most intolerant person to have ever stepped on that place and whoever dares to talk back receives hell?”

Sirius, who closed his fist over his lap as Regulus provoked him, quickly stood up from his chair with the scratching sound of the chair against the floor, but before he could grab his brother by the hair and put some sense to him, Regulus recoiled in his chair as he appealed to his usual card. “If you dare, I’ll tell father.”

“Little shit,” he chastised, stopping in his tracks, “always hiding behind daddy. Coward,” he finished, with a mocking tone followed by a drop of octaves as the last insult is spoken in much more seriousness; the same that Bella used when crossed.

“Please,” Regulus scoffed, fully aware it was time to leave, “appeals to my courage won’t lead me to let you hit me. It’s insulting that you think so little of my intelligence.”

Sirius seemed to soften as the tension on his shoulders was gone together with the furrow of his brows, giving place to that helpless gaze that frequently worked on making Regulus relent. The magical duo of ‘you’ and ‘hit’ always did the trick to calm his brother’s nerves. “No, Reg, I wasn’t going to–”

“Don’t lie to me, Sirius.” Regulus’s tone was biting, with an underlying tinge of hurt.

As the older brother looked down in embarrassment and regret, the younger stood up and straightened his back in an attempt to recover some dignity after recoiling. “I believe that’s my cue to leave.”

Sirius immediately caught hold of him, much more gentle than he planned to, short before. “Wait, I’m sorry.”

Regulus struggled to get out, and Sirius wouldn’t relent, weren’t for those next words. “You have made a habit of apologizing, and yet you never mean it, Sirius. And let's face it, the problem isn’t them being Slytherins. The problem is me having something that doesn’t gravitate towards you. Grow up, Sirius. This is suffocating.”

Sirius let him leave; this little quarrel could be fixed later.

Sirius successfully contacted the seer, who had nothing but a name to give him. “An old friend of mine, his family has passed knowledge over the nature of your problem from the times of William the Conqueror.”

And so he left the house, pursuing this ancient knowledge. The finger in which was bestowed his gift, the light brown mark, tingling, a good sign if prior experience was to be counted. Whenever he felt the tingling, something positive related to the bound unfailingly happened. 

Like their first kiss, back when they were young enough for plays, in one of the few times he convinced Regulus to play couple after a long time of convincing.

Mostly, they copied mother and father, and despite Reggie's many protests, he always played wife while Sirius played husband, a childish and primitive attempt to lure his soulmate to the idea of compromise, and he even used to sneak in their parents bedroom and take some of mother’s jewels out of the wooden box over the vanity, as well as her satin ribbons. 

With the jewels, he covered Regulus in precious stones and golden bands, claiming he would shower him in presents and riches when they grew up. With the ribbons, he adorned the black waves that felt softer to the touch that the luxurious fur coats mother possessed, smelled better than any of her french perfumes. Sirius omitted the painting part, for Regulus already looked perfect on his own, prettier than any of Cissy’s handmade dolls. Reggie’s eyes had a glimmer that a false one could never have, his skin, a uniform pale tone sometimes colored as he blushed, a pristiness that even the finest porcelain couldn’t replicate, his small mouth with full, pink lips, looked warmer than the painted porcelain room-temperature ones, forming altogether a face better sculpted by nature than a lifeless doll could ever be, by the hands of the most talented artisan. 

Regulus seemed uncomfortable with using women's accessories, but Sirius waved it off as the aesthetic aspect wasn't the point, but the idea of being a couple. 

Sirius even tried to put on him a beautiful, delicate pair of earrings with a tiny onyx envolted by sapphires, pointing out they matched Regulus colors perfectly, but upon having one lobe perforated by the silver sharp point, his brother teared up and threatened to go downstairs and tell mother about Sirius taking her jewels for playing. 

He saw in the threat, most likely empty in intention, the perfect opportunity and managed to turn the tables, stating that, if Regulus refused to comply with this task, he would have to do something else in compensation.

The ‘something else’ consisted in an order to stay quiet and with closed eyes, which Regulus, despite the flawed logic, complied. “That’s what married couples do, Reggie. That and more, aren’t we playing married, after all?” So he sealed their lips, took in the sweetness. And his finger tingled.

Besides kissing (“don’t tell, Reg, or we’ll be in trouble”) they used to dance clumsily around the room, and while they never put music on, it was never silent (Regulus was terribly uncoordinated and stomped over Sirius’s feet several times but he didn’t mind as long as he had free pass to place a hand over Reg’s lower back and guide him over the muffed sound of their feet over the carpet and the giggles whenever he lifted the smaller boy in the air, a step they’d properly have lessons for not long after). They also pretended to sleep, and Sirius used the opportunity to lay as close as he could, gluing their arms together. 

Reminding himself that there was no time for reminiscences, Sirius managed to focus in gathering the information he needed.

The man had a dusty shop at Knockturn Alley, with a rusty sign indicating the family and the nature of the business. Of course. However, despite first impressions over the unimpressive façade, after entering, the soft singing of a bell at the door denouncing his entrance, he found that the place didn’t reek of dark magic as he was expecting. And was cleaner than the outside impression suggested.

“Welcome, Sir. How may I help you?” An old wizard surged from between shelves full of jars containing potions ingredients. Despite being of advanced age, he looked in much better shape than the friend who referenced him, walking aidless and with a straight back.

“I contacted Mr. Galanis, regarding a research of mine, and he suggested you might be of help. I am searching for a fertility potion, something strong enough to...transcend certain barriers.”

“Ah.” The man gave him a knowing smile, full of yellowed teeth. “Indeed, my old friend mentioned the possibility of your visit, Mr. Black. By any barrier, I suppose you mean something beyond a condition in a lady’s womb, such as...not possessing one. Yes, my family passed upon the secret knowledge of a potion capable of bringing life even under otherwise impossible conditions for many generations. However, it takes rare and expensive ingredients, and requires very strict monitoring and ambientation, as well as a good amount of patience, for it takes just as long as life grows in the womb to brew.”

Sirius shifted his weight on a leg to another in discomfort. This surely was a swindle to take easy gold out of a fool’s desperation. But what if not?

He decided to give it a try, even if it most likely would lower his earnings on his Gringotts vault for nothing.

“And have you ever brewed this one, Mr... Markovnikov, I presume?” The man acquiesced with a slight head movement. “Would it be able to make pregnancy viable for a male?” He managed to speak firmy, but felt like there was fire on his face. This conversation turned out more embarrassing than he had anticipated.

“Me? Yes, but only once, though if it’s a reference you’re looking for, I’m afraid I cannot violate my client’s privacy, besides, the last vial destined for male consumption was made a little over forty years, by my late grandfather, on very...ah confidential terms.”

Whether it was true or not, surely it would be impossible to find records, for this subject was naturally not something to parade around the wizarding community. Male pregnancies had less than twenty confirmed cases recorded, the most recent published notes from over a century ago, and among the information, there was nothing on how it was achieved. It was rarely discussed, but the subject seemed more or less accepted among traditional pureblood families although not openly, for what Sirius could notice, pursued only in cases of extreme necessity to keep the bloodline, due to being considered emasculating and difficult to discover how to achieve the methods. The Selwyins were the only case Sirius could catch wind of, a few generations ago, though there was nothing documented. 

Although not really frowned upon by purebloods who would do just anything to not extinguish their names, it certainly was by the overall magical community, just like marriages within family, which was accepted until the middle ages and from them on progressively condemned by popular opinion, something most of the Sacred Twenty-Eight used to openly disagree, until the creation of a law that deemed a crime marriages between blood relatives closer than cousins by early eighteenth century. Fifty years later an amendment was created due to pressure regarding soulbonds, led by a Lestrange, a Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot who had a sister as his soulmate. Wasn’t for that, Sirius’s life would be even more complicated.

That's the influence of those mudbloods you’re so fond of, Mother cruelly pointed once. They’d condemn your affection as perversion and sin. Honestly, he could see why muggles' principles could influence this general change of thoughts within the wizarding community and their motivations, especially with the inquisitions and reinforcement of their religious principles. He just didn’t care. 

The man continued to clarify particularities.

“Also, there’s a detail about the necessary ingredients: to reach its strongest variation to work on a male, it’ll need a very special ingredient. A flower, a special kind only found in a certain place, is very hard to find, and it must be collected under special conditions to preserve it’s full properties. I am in no condition to find those, and none of my ingredients providers sell this one, for a very simple reason: it must be the one involved in the conception, the one who will put life to the womb, who first touches the flower.”

Sirius’s eyes widened in recognizance.

“Ah, I see you must have heard of the tale that involves this particular potion. If things move further, I’ll, of course, teach you how to find the enchanted land, under the condition that you commit, under a magical vow, to never pass upon this knowledge to anyone. If you must, you can bring one or two other wizards of your trust to aid you as the search could take years, under the same condition: the ones to step inside the land must vow their silence under magic. Family secret, I’m sure you understand.”

He knew who could help him. Father was an eximious hunter, the best among the little hunting group of his, had a good eye for hidden things and good ability with tracking charms. He only hoped to be convincing enough.

“Yes, thank you for the information. I will keep in touch so we can discuss details and set a deal.”

“You’re welcome, Mr. Black. It’s always a pleasure making business with your House, and please, don’t hesitate to owl any questions.”

Kreacher, who’d certainly be very useful, was categorically excluded, the potions maker wasn’t letting an elf learn the secret because the thing could easily aparate there and ruin the purpose of making a vow of silence.

The next option, uncle Alphard, was easy to convince; he was, after all, an adventurous soul, always traveling around the world collecting interesting stories about his findings.

Father, on the other hand, was as difficult as Sirius expected, but he first thought of Orion for good reason and wasn’t going to back down on this.

So, upon his father’s insistence in denying his aid, Sirius lost his short patience and hissed a threat he had every intention to fulfill.

“If you insist on your refusal to help to your own son, father, and I fail to find the flower, I swear when you last expect I’ll take Regulus and flee, I’ll tie up him and shut him with silencing charms if I have to, but I will take him away from this house, and you’ll be left with no heir. If I can’t have my soulmate, neither will you, to tie him to some tart for power and gold.”

They were born to belong to each other, and the idea of his own father attempting to refrain him from taking what was his right infuriated him.

He must have slipped out something in his tone, or in his eyes, something meant to be kept in the dark, because for a moment, father lost his composure and looked hesitant , and Orion Black was normally above such display of weakness.

But father begrudgingly complied, and that was all Sirius could ask for.

Contrary to the tale, Sirius found that the place wasn’t as simple as a stumble to find. It had to be accessed through a portkey from a specific point, a circle of stones that held ancient magic, and happened to be, to father’s immense displeasure, a touristic point for muggles.

Before venturing to unknown space, Sirius stated all he knew about the place and the condition to the Queen of the Night to be picked: only at it’s blossom, a night per year, and by Sirius’s hands. Uncle Alphard contributed with a set of three mirrors, enchanted for communication for when they follow separate paths, and father with a couple of spells to mark the place in sections so they won’t lose time looking at the same space and to trace a path should any of them be successful.

Under strong disillusionment charms, they crossed the grass until the center of the circle, father holding an expression as though there was a faint bad smell in the air due to some muggles they found in the way. With the strong, nauseating centripetal pull of the portkey, a small vase, spinning their forms away to transpass the barriers of place and time, soon they found themself in a tapestry of bluebells. There were some trees casting shadows on the way and blissfully offering shelter from the burning sun, growling larger in number the further they went. The place was eerily silent, and all the fauna Sirius could spot resumed to a few butterflies on the way and the odd buzzing. But strange as the place was, they spotted no threat on the first day. Sirius hoped it stayed like this, because seeing as life from that place couldn’t be taken, upon any menace all they would be able to do was to slow or stop the threat long enough to flee. Perhaps maim, but never deter for good.

The search continued for a long time, fruitless. Father started only partaking on weekends, claiming too much paperwork accumulated on his desk; uncle Alphard had less excuses to give, but seemed subdued at their lack of progress.

But not Sirius, never him. He kept the same energy, waking before the first sights of sun every single day, until Regulus pleaded with him to reserve at least a day per week for rest.

Unwillingly, he conceived, because he never could ignore a pleading from his Regulus, no matter what his brother claimed.

It was in one of those resting days that he received a letter from Remus, seeking reconciliation. He even apologized for having offended Sirius back at school, and for that, he answered positively, already knowing that letting the reason they split be forgiven and forgotten would most likely restore his friendship with James and Peter as well, and found that, although being far too busy to spend time missing his friends, a reunion would be nice as long as they kept respectful towards his soulbound and don’t waste his time and patience with their nonsense.

Soul magic was, after way older and wiser than any of them could fathom, it’s reach, beyond human conventions of right or wrong. Soulbound had ancient origins, the first written registers within the wizarding community did draw a very vague idea about it, but it seemed that a exponential grow happened after a plague that greatly diminished the wizarding population in Europe in the beginning of ninth century, and there was the hypothesis that it’s growth in number, especially to pureblood and half-blood families with low number of marriages with muggleborns and rarely ever occurring to muggleborns, was magic’s reaction for the birthing of more magical children, since the number of squibs are substantially higher in families with less than five generations of only magical people, though existing in all levels of magic society. A strong argument for those supporting pureblood supremacy political parties, but Sirius couldn't care less for those pompous bastards who fancied themselves as superior and their parroted speeches.

They met at a pub, with James and Peter invited too, and hours and hours of reminiscences from their years at Hogwarts later reestablished, although not to its full potential, their tarnished friendship, in the frail equilibrium of a badly executed Reparo charm that only mended the surface, letting the small cracks hide inside. Sirius knew Remus thought of him as impulsive, dismissive of others feelings and not trustable after the Whomping Willow incident (and Sirius begrudgingly admitted to himself that there was some truth to it – after all, while he didn’t necessarily wanted to get Snivellus killed, he wouldn’t particularly care if he did), and he knew James wouldn’t change his mind, only control his tongue at most. Peter would follow along if James did. 

Well, he was willing to give them a chance.

Regulus looked absolutely delectable at the graduation party, all cold beauty and haughty face for the sake of keeping a façade of confidence. He was chosen by Slughorn to make the speech representing his House, a position Sirius knew he must have been reluctant to accept. But Reg was still a Black, and along with his shyness and reserved character walked his pride, thus making it hard to decline an opportunity to show himself as the model student he was.

And Sirius couldn’t look away from the high collar of Regulus’s shirt covering the evidence of earlier in the day activities as his brother stood before everyone proudly, his voice firm and clear even to the last row of seats thanks to an amplifying charm, wrapped in the finest fabrics that composed his robes, black and dark green with a few details in silver on the sleeves and next to the colar, the snake on the slytherin crest attached to his chest shining against the light as silvery as his eyes that seemed to gaze at everyone and no one at the same time. When he was done, he strided between the long lasting claps to his seat with pretended confidence, taking his seat among his colleagues, a row before Sirius’s place. Nothing like the pile of anxiety from weeks before, when Reggie sent letters confessing how he thought he couldn’t write a decent speech, and when he came home, the endless rehearsals in his room. 

All he had to do was to fix his gaze on his brother’s back for Regulus to feel his stare and discreetly look over his shoulder. One fragment of a gaze later, Sirius left discreetly to the lateral entrance, under the cheerful voice of the Headmaster, shadowed by the row of columns that sustained the level above, knowing that soon he would be followed.

It wasn’t as soon as he expected, but Regulus eventually found him behind one of the many curves of the castle's stonewalls.

“What took you so long?” He questioned, impatient. Sirius was usually the one to make people wait, not the contrary.

“Barty’s father. It seems like he’s finally interested in taking me for an apprenticeship. Must be Slughorn’s incessant talking, it seems like finally being his favourite paid off.” Regulus replied, almost dismissive after getting what he was chasing after for over a year.

“Father won’t like this. He wanted you to work under Cygnus.”

“Yes, well, I can learn much more with Crouch,” he shrugged, sitting between Sirius’s legs and resting his back on his chest. “He’s brilliant, and takes his work at the Ministry much more seriously than uncle Cygnus ever could bother to. He’s lazy and accommodated; Crouch is ambitious with an ascending career, and from what I hear, expects nothing less of his assistants and interns. I’ll tell father I’m sorry, but since the opportunity surged, I can’t ignore it.”

“You mean you’ll try to make him believe you didn’t move a finger for this and it’s just innocently accepting a good offer.”

Regulus looked up to him with a small smile. “A Black must settle for the best.”

Sirius leaned his head down for a kiss, closing his arms tightly around his brother, until his neck began hurting for the uncomfortable position. It was a little awkward, with Regulus having to twist his neck so Sirius let go and settled only for the hold of his waist.

“Indeed. But Crouch doesn’t like dark-inclined families,” Sirius warned.

“He seems to like me well enough; I’ve been spending enough time at his house visiting Barty, and although he isn’t particularly present, he always regarded me with respect,” Regulus retorted, fully aware that Sirius never quite liked his best friend and probably just wanted him to have as few connections as possible with Barty. 

He shivered at the memory of Sirius's reaction last summer upon discovering Barty would stay the week at Grimmauld Place, and Regulus planned on sharing his bedroom. It was just a sleepover, but of course Sirius had to act all possessive and weird. 

Sirius painted him blue with a strong grip, and he purposely left the dark colours on his wrist to fade naturally, without the aid of spells, just for the guilty shining in Sirius’s eyes every time he caught the view of his doing; later he almost regretted his actions when father inquired about the fading greenish after catching a sight of his wrist at breakfast, and upon his confession, stormed out to drag by the hair a still sleeping Sirius out of bed, who fell with a loud stomp over the polished wood, and warn him that the next time he caught even an inch of Regulus’s skin marred, he would beat Sirius black and blue. 

Regulus, in all his life, had never seen father poise such a commanding demeanour over a domestic affair, such an intensity on his gaze full of hatred violence, and for the first time, it occurred to him that the extension of Sirius’s obsession didn’t pass as unnoticed to everyone around them as he had assumed.

That was the most scared Regulus had ever been, never having faced the possibility of physical punishments in their home. He couldn’t imagine how it felt for Sirius, whom he couldn’t help but be sorry for, even if his brother got what he deserved. Later, this became Regulus’s trump for whenever Sirius showed signs of upcoming violence.

He wished his parents would spend the same amount of effort teaching his brother about respect as they spend teaching him obedience. Sirius certainly was the kind to need some extra lessons over respecting boundaries. Then the whole breakfast incident wouldn’t happen. Maybe Sirius wouldn’t transfer all the weight of obedience to the next in line and treat him as a property he was behooved with, and himself wouldn’t feel guilty over such things as having friends and spending time with them.

“Siri?”

Regulus felt the slight vibration from Sirius’s humming on the back of his head.

“Why do you think we were chosen?” He inquired, not even sure there existed an answer besides mere coincidence.

Sirius feigned ignorance. He enjoyed hearing Regulus talking about their connection. “Chosen?”

“Yes, by magic. Why did magic pick both of us for a pair, if it's such a troublesome union, you and I? Were not the marks on our hands and the memory from the bond being consolidated, we could be in Azkaban. So why, what picture us as perfect halves? 

“I haven’t the faintest clue. Maybe we aren't even meant as a perfect combination, maybe we're not perfect halves, and that makes us have to put in effort to function as one imperfect full. But I wouldn’t wish it to be different, I'm committed to embrace any flaws; I don’t want the easy route, an easier soulmate, I just want it to be you. Why, would you? Prefer someone else?” The older brother inquired with a frown, and barely hidden alarm.

“No, not really. But I don’t know how much of my thoughts and wants are influenced by the soul magic, and how would I feel towards you if it didn’t exist.”

“Why does it matter, though? You can’t change how things turned out. We were meant to be. Daydreaming about other life won't lead you to anywhere but frustration builded by your own account. It's what you can do about reality that really will do you good. And in the reality we’re living in,” and for good measure, Sirius encircled his waist once again and held him just a little too tight, “No one could love you as much as I do.”

That was Sirus, full of violent fondness, always stepping just a little over the limit, ready to fall back in the close line where Regulus wasn’t willing to escape nor complain, trapped by the possessiveness of his embrace and the unique feeling of their bond when they’re close. If there’s such a thing as loving in excess, Sirius certainly falls into this category. But again, when his brother isn’t all about taking things too far? That makes his bright, magnetic charm; and that makes Regulus’s weakness, his doom. Doomed for being loved too much, and doomed learning how to take it all, growing from a naïve child making precocious discoveries while staring at the vulgar posters on Sirius’s wall and feeling warm fingers and heavy breathing below his waist to a man ready to be covered with unrestrained craving. Perhaps this is what makes them the perfect match, after all. Unrestrained willingness for unrestrained craving. 

He could only hope Sirius couldn’t read in the depthness of his fall, otherwise he would lose even more to his neverending wish to please the one who got such a strong hold on him.

“Yes, I know. I love you too.” Regulus adjusted his position, as Sirius' arms tightly wrapped around his ribs, and closed his eyes; Sirius gave him silence to think before they needed to go back.

After all the boring talk, everyone finally went to the courtyard where dinner was to be served, and Sirius had to put up with Regulus’s annoying friends approaching their table after Orion and Walburga left, and began talking about apprenticeships and jobs – most, painfully obvious display of nepotism, not that himself could point a finger at anyone – and things Sirius couldn't care less, until the first mentionings of a trip was mentioned, and Reg began throwing badly disguised worried glances at him and fidgeting with a glass; it began making sense as they shared more details and were talking as if his little brother was included.

Regulus didn’t mention any graduation trip to him.

Sirius wasn’t liking how the conversation was progressing.

Crouch, because the little shit was always involved when Reg was about to leave, had the audacity to put his filthy mouth on Regulus’s wine glass and finish it off as someone – Sirius hadn’t paid attention to their names and couldn’t care less – gave a playful punch on his brother’s arm as he mentioned Regulus’s proficiency in French and girls in beachwear and– what?

“Sorry,” he interfered, taking his brother’s arm and getting on his feet, “If you excuse us for a minute, I’ll have a word with my soulmate and he’ll be right back.”

“Sirius!” Regulus hissed seemingly surprised as much as annoyed as he stood up and began following Sirius’s lead, still holding his arm, leaving behind awkward silence and incredulous gazes. Except for Crouch, who seemed amused at the situation.

While they didn’t vouch for the bond to be a secret, there was mutual understanding that it would be best to not announce it to the hole school, as Hogwarts was full of teenagers eager to point fingers, and a soulbound between brothers would obviously paint them as targets – and Sirius was already a troublemaker in his times as a student without provocations of this nature. If he reacted badly with the Marauders, he would probably get to the point of being expelled if someone provoked him or Reggie. And that’s saying a lot, considering all the things he did and escaped with mild punishments in comparison to his transgressions. Dumbledore and McGonnagal must have really liked him. Or someone like Snivellus using this information for advantage. There was huge blackmailing potential in something like this.

They kept walking until reaching an empty place far enough for prying eyes and ears, and Sirius reluctantly let the arm under his firm hold go as Regulus tried to twist his wrist free, mouth set in a thin line and glaring.

“Are you mad? Sirius, why did you do that?” Regulus inquired.

Sirius answered in a beat, still upset about finding out about the trip by third parties.“Why were you hiding things from me?”

“Oh, so that's why you were trying to jeopardize my friendships and make everything awkward. I’ll let you know that I was going to tell you tonight, and I don’t see why such a fuss over something trivial as a graduation trip. I wasn’t planning on doing anything behind your back, if that’s what you’re assuming.”

“It’s not you that I doubt, it’s them. If Rosier is going–”

“Evan is not going, and you should stop trying to isolate me because someone flirted with me once and stopped trying when I made clear my lack of interest. This is the kind of behaviour that refrained me from telling you earlier, you know. You make me worry over your reactions, and that makes me hesitate before telling you things.”

“So now you’re trying to put the blame on me? Unlike you, I never did anything behind your back–”

“Really, Sirius?” Regulus interrupted, and Sirius knew well what his brother was thinking about.

During a Slitheryn quidditch practice in his last year, Sirius went after Regulus during the growing animosity between he and James, and after asking a couple of snakes went in direction of the vestiary, only to find Evan Rosier getting too close to his brother and, by his mannerisms, clearly attempting to flirt; his brother, who looked very uncomfortable was trying to dodge Rosier’s lack of respect for personal space and wandering hands brushing thin arms, until his attempts were defeated by that slimy snake brushing a lock of ebony hair behind Reg’s ear, the gesture that made Sirius step forward intending to punch that smirk out of Evan’s face, but it was his brother who spoke first at the time, finally losing his patience and inhibition to act and telling his housemate, basically, to piss off. Only in more polite terms. 

Sirius knew that might not be enough, so despite his row with James, he used the opportunity of a night where both him and Remus were out to rounds and took the cloak and map to put Rosier in his place. Peter probably noticed, but he didn’t count, since avoiding conflict was his usual route.

So, after finding his way to Slytherin common room and spending a long time waiting for someone to say the password, Sirius found that, to his luck, Evan was alone in his dormitory and conveniently easy to threaten. Not that his target seemed a particularly fearful wizard, no, but Sirius could be extremely convincing on his act when he needed to input fear. Considering who he was, it was easy to let darkness flow and detach his mind of boundaries for the easy flow of his soulbound magic sieve the right ideas on his brain.

It worked; Rosier seemed to blend less and less on Regulus’s crowd and move on to other groups, though Sirius had the displeasure of finding him around his brother a few times – at least not alone, and not with that same attempts to charm his soulmate. 

Regulus’s irritated voice put him back to the discussion. 

“Yes, Sirius. I know all about you pinning Evan on his room floor and not at all subtle threats. I had a lot of trouble trying to keep his mouth shut so you didn’t run the risk of getting expelled.” He crossed his arms and looked away as if to check if they still had privacy. “You ought to let me deal with this sort of matters by myself. If someone had tried to force their way with me I would’ve understood; but you really crossed the limits. The worst is that it was not even an isolated incident, I know that Potter’s levicorpus over that Ravenclaw girl in your sixth year was not a coincidence, you must have induced him after you saw her trying to convince me to a date. And don’t think I didn’t notice you had some tracking spell over me, you strangely managed to find me in the most improbable places and pretend it was a coincidence. Stop acting as if I’m one flirt away from abandoning you and fleeing home or something, or if I am some possession you’re trying to keep for yourself. I told you before, this behaviour is suffocating me, Sirius.” 

Regulus passed a hand over his hair in frustration, messing some strands out of place. “To be honest, I am putting faith in that hunting of yours, but I fear what will become of me if you actually manage to make that bloody potion work, as you seem to hold little respect for me as an independent person. I love you, Siri, but the shape your love sometimes is frightening.” Now looking more apologeting than angry, the younger brother put a hand on Sirius's shoulders as a comforting gesture. “I’ll go back to my friends now. I get that the bound makes everything a bit too intense sometimes, just please, don’t just toss my words away. I only ask that you think about it. You don’t need to stalk me around Sirius, can’t you see–” and now in sotto voce, with a sweet and vulnerable quality to it, he confessed, “can’t you see I’m already yours?”

Regulus walked into the bright lights of the party, and Sirius felt his voice scratching his throat. It would do no good to both of them if he acted accordingly to his impulses. It would drive his little one away.

Begrudgingly, he let his brother go without a word of protest, after Regulus humoured him with a goodbye kiss that left father irritated, and focused on what mattered the most. 

It was on the ninth day of Regulus’s absence, under a bright golden sun and a few sunset-tinged clouds in a lonely journey as both father and uncle Alphard had their respective businesses to take care of that Sirius first got on the path out of the same monotony of every search that happened until that point.

Through dark green leaves and ominous shadows, a glimpse of red light caught his eye, and the more he glanced, the greater was its allure; eventually, that unknown source of light put his mind in a strange trance to follow that unusual brightness. The light wind whispered, but neither his skin nor his ears took notice; a chirping at far caught a fraction of his mind provisorily, but then there was the light again, twinkling and dancing slowly in the air. Red was the tinge of the danger, yet its allure was welcomed in his conscience with a strong, persistent pull. 

His feet padded through the soft grass on their own account, following the traveling red. Eventually, he found himself in a path with low grass surrounded by trails of pomegranate trees on both sides, and he walked on the path as the sun laid lower and lower until the bright spots of stars offered their limited illumination over the deep blue night sky. The hollow song of a cuckoo close put him out of the trance and, with his wand ready, another pomegranate tree surged in the middle of the path, seemingly out of nowhere, with blurry edges, dry as the death of the wintertime, although surely the austerity of winter was not welcomed inside a place that seemed frozen on a whimsical spring, strangely carrying many fruits despite being naked of leafs, as if the bright-coloured fruits were misplaced, and didn’t belong to that three.

A cuckoo – must be the same that sang just instants before – flew before him and landed on a branch; a powerful sound made him grasp his wand tighter: it was a roar.

A dark curse was at the tip of his tongue as behind the tree surged a lion, stepping wary and wise in the eyes, strangely black as one would expect a crow to be, matching the night and possessing a majestic thick coat of darkness around its head. The animal walked with the pace and tension of a predator targeting its prey, with the care of not moving too abruptly. Strangely – as everything was turning out to be since he felt the push of the portkey – the creature stopped not far from the tree, and stood merely watching Sirius.

Before the first syllable, the first wand movement was done, he felt a painful bite on his nape and fell over soft grass, his vision beginning to falter just as behind the beast paws, he saw the glow of a miracle: the queen of the night, far enough in his state yet reachable if he ever found this path again. Cold sweat began forming on his forehead and he blinked and prayed not to die facing the object of his goal, shining and fragile – much smaller than he would’ve thought.

What a failure, Sirius lamented.

His conscience was wandering, slowly drifting away as a feeling of numbness was taking dominion of his mind and body; turning complete phrases into vague murmurs.

He saw the paws walking away, turning the creature’s back to him, because he ended up being only prey, and a caught one, therefore not worthy of the measured attention and carefulness, and that was the last his eyes captured before blackness. A cautionary tale. As his eyes could no longer capture the sight, his mind nourished a last image of his soulmate. The wife was dead and the man wasn’t any better.

His mind soon followed the dark. 

Darkness and silence. A strand of conscience, barely existing in its frailty and wander. Fear and regret. The first coherent thoughts, slowly ascending through the stairway from unconscious to aware. To wake up.

Sirius felt the cold grass under him with his fingertips until they grasped the familiarity of the thin wood of his wand before he opened his eyes. Taking into his surroundings – no pomegranate trees, higher grass and many plants around – it became clear that he was moved while unconscious.

Delicately, his hand reached the back of his neck, expecting a feeling of the bite he surely received, but felt nothing abnormal upon touching. Keeping wary of his surroundings, he slowly stood on his feet, and a glance was enough for him to realize that he was at the same place the red light first caught his eyes; the starting point to whatever happened.

He casted the tracing spell, full of fear that it would fail, but sparks flowed from his wand creating a trace with some curves and, wary of the earlier events, he went home without walking along to see if it really worked. He couldn’t act precipitately and risk committing a mistake just as the answer to his prays got so close. Sirius was an impulsive man, but some things he needed to be extra cautious about.

There was a commotion as Sirius stepped at the porch: Regulus, who apparently had been pacing around the entrance hall, came to a halt as soon the door was opened. Walburga was leaning on the wall, between two portraits with her arms crossed; Orion was coming down the stairs, seeming somewhat apprehensive, and all pairs of eyes turned to him with the same urgency.

“Uh...hey,” he awkwardly began, only to be stopped by the fastaproach and firm hold of Regulus’s thin arms around him.

“What happened?” His brother quavered, voice choked by worry.

“I guess I was attacked by something, but listen, I think I found–”

“You guess? Sirius, you need immediate health care!” Still firmly embracing his older brother, Regulus looked up to him, and Sirius wanted nothing more than relive his clear distress. “I felt it– you were in danger! Something bad happened, I know! My hand burned and I immediately came back; let’s just please hurry to St. Mungos.” As he finished, Sirius felt a firm grip on his hand as Regulus tried to make him follow along, probably to the fireplace on the adjacent room where there was an open floo channel.

“Can’t we just summon one here? I really don’t think there's a need to go to the hospital. I just need a healer to check the back of my neck; I felt a bite, but didn’t see what bit me and am not in pain or anything.”

A worried Regulus checked his nape only to confirm his suspicions: there were no signs of a bite.

“I’ll summon a healer to confirm there’s nothing wrong,” father said, turning back and leaving the room. Mother kept her eye on him, but didn’t say anything besides a light scold for not being careful enough.

The healer that came to examine him couldn’t find anything wrong, and Sirius began suspecting it could just be a dream. 

The glinting magic trail casted upon his departure for tracking suggested the opposite, but as apparently there wasn’t any damage done, all he had to do was to submit to being closely observed by a very zealous Regulus, and all would end up being well.

The next few days were permeated by an unyielding will to just leave and go check the trail and the dooming impediment of his beloved’s wish for him to stay at home, to rest and be monitored – an issue that turned out to have the pleasant side of Regulus’s constant company, checking him day and night. The feeling of danger from their bond must have really scared Regulus, because he usually wasn’t so clingy.

These resting days served as enough to ease his brother’s worry as there were no signs at all of an impending curse or condition derived from the bite – which could, after all be all but a product of imagination upon a stressful situation.

The holding promise of advancements sparked once again the adventurous and positive spirit of uncle Alphard. Father, on the other hand, was wary of Sirius’s telling of the red light but nonetheless was ready to go on the next morning; they followed the same routine to the circle of stones, holding the portkey, entering the place, although this time, their stride carried a sense of finality that only grew as they walked along the last mark left and it did ended up leading to the path of pomegranate trees. 

At this point, his finger felt hot and his heart was thumping too hard, and he wanted to hurry, to run through the low grass and light breeze and lines of trees until reaching the flower; yet patiently kept the same determined pace, because father would surely begin to rant if they separate, as now there was a possible danger around. While his prior experience felt relatively short, as he wasn’t even fully aware of his surroundings and time passed without him sparing a thought on it, this time, the walk seemed painfully long – Alphard mentioned using brooms, but Sirius didn’t want to risk changing anything about the path, too fearful that it would somehow not end up in the same result. The long walk felt as if it was the only right course of action, and so he firmly followed intuition.

As the night covered the nature surrounding them in shadows, Sirius began feeling a thrill of excitement; a sudden burst of energy and he knew, even before he could spot it, that his flower was close. The hotness on his finger grew so much in its intensity that he began avoiding the touch of his mark against his other fingers, and his palm.

Orion was the one who first caught the view of the Queen of the Night, sadly closed – which was to be expected, as the likelihood of them finding it was low enough excluding the parameter of making the discovery in the single night of the year it would blossom.

But this was it. His answer, and he would come check it every single day. 

Fortune was finally on his side, it seemed, because less than two months later, he arrived on the same stop and found the soft petals, in the purest white with tinges of orange and red at the ends, open and ready to be collected.

Still aware of the possibility of being fooled by the potion maker, he paid a handsome amount for the potion, hopeful that all his struggling, all his waiting would be worth it. Nine months of brewing, and his prays would be answered.

The following day, father summoned him to his study and gave him a long lecture of what responsibilities taking care of a family entailed, never mentioning Regulus's name, or acknowledging the potion in the process of brewing. 

“Your duty is to put family above all else, keep your loyalties to your House, in the general sense but most importantly to your immediate dependants, as you are behooved with the care of outside matters to keep who’s relying on you in a safe position and well provided for. Achieving that entails taking care of details that I’m passing to you, and one day, long after you assume your position, you’ll pass the knowledge onto the next in line.”

His brother has always been a sour subject between them; his father clearly wasn’t pleased with a possible union between Reg and him, and Sirius never stopped insinuating the possibility as much as he could. This time, Orion simply didn’t acknowledge what Sirius would make come true; if the apparent neutrality was for still being vehemently against but avoiding pointless fights or if his father was finally beginning to accept the idea, Sirius couldn’t be sure. He did take place in Sirius’s search, sure, but that didn’t seem to make much of a difference in his position.

“Are you sure you want to do this, Padfoot?”

James had that mildly nauseated look on his features, all the righteousness he was raised to muster (but conveniently ignored at the right occasions) composing the stiffness of his posture, sitting on a ottoman at the end of Sirius’s four poster bed. His fingertips were becoming white at his firm grasping of the soft deep blood-red fabric of his seat, and by the overall look he surely had much more to ask, much more to say in attempt to convince Sirius of the wrongness of all this bidding.

Sirius hesitated for long to tell him, but James ought to discover within the next months anyway, so a week before the ritual, he revealed the goal of his endless days out. And if Prongs couldn't respect his bound, couldn’t learn to at least keep his rightness and outspoken ways to himself on this matter, then their friendship was doomed to a second – and permanent – fall.

“I mean,” the tanned boy hesitated, passing a careless hand through the mess of his dark hair in a clear sign of frustration, “Is it safe for Regulus? Did he agree to this at all?”

“There is little knowledge on the subject of male bearers,” and Sirius noticed his friend’s flinch at the latest word, “But the family won’t accept our union otherwise, and so far there are no registers of deaths– not for the bearer, only for the fetus, though is almost unheard of as this potion is as powerful as a fertility potion can get. As long as Reg rests and is monitored, is all going to be alright.”

Sirius leaned on his bed and stretched his arm to reach the small glass of candy on the bedside table, unwrapping a liqueur-filled drop and tasting the sweet bliss before bothering to answer James’s second question. “And yes, he agrees. By the way, your lack of faith in me, by implying his consent wouldn’t be detrimental to this matter, is highly offensive.” He feigned hurt, and tossed a candy in James’s direction, watching as it got caught thanks to stellar reflexes, improved greatly by years of being in the Quidditch team.

“Shut it, Pads, I saw you dragging him to Merlin knows what for years at school. You can be very– ah, coercitive. Just wanted to check that he was even at par with this craziness, that’s all.”

James tossed the candy in his mouth and pretended to be relaxed; pretended that just a minute ago he wasn’t tense as the statues around in Grimmauld Place..

“So I’m assuming your family is alright with this?” At Sirius’s nod, he continued, “But what about...you know...everyone else? I guess most purebloods won’t exactly care, but for the rest... your brother doesn’t strike me as uncaring about ousiders’s views as you are. Kid sure made an effort to keep a good reputation at Hogwarts. I remember how he always volunteered for boring tasks at prefect reunions when the teachers showed up to ask favours.”

“Yeah, Reggie is a good boy. He sure is daddy’s favourite for always being at the ready to obey his every command, and Slughorn looked ready to wipe tears at the graduation dinner. He thinks making connections with the right sort is important. Well, I guess he’s not wrong as it did end up bringing him good over the years. And he got an offer from Crouch. Can you imagine that? Working for that man must be hell, but Reg will surely enjoy every second of being the first apprentice the guy accepted in years. But anyway, we discussed it. Reg will have to inform Crouch to take a license, of course, but other than that, he just wants to stay at home during pregnancy and my parents and I not to go out advertising it, though at some point it will become public knowledge, obviously. But I’m ready to hex anyone who messes with him or my child.”

While the Potters weren't nearly as well connected within the ministry as the Blacks, James surely understood what an opportunity Regulus got, judging by his impressed expression. The Crouch name held power and influence, and together with the Black name, it sure was the recipe for a high position within the Ministry. 

It made his chest fill with warm pride; Regulus always worked hard for his accomplishments – add that to intelligence, dedication and his impressive school marks that were nothing but predictable – and deserved every recompense he was getting.

While a part of him – big and obscure, lingering at the surface of his mind – wanted to keep his soulmate all to himself, he reluctantly recognized it wouldn’t do well for Regulus to refrain him from showing all his potential and capabilities as his little one so clearly seeked to, as much as Sirius wish it wouldn’t be like this.

It could even make his brother want to go away from him. Sirius was beginning to accept that it was better to let Regulus wander; whenever he wandered, he would always go back to him. A pendulum, destined to make the backward trajectory as a law of nature, as long as Sirius was careful enough not to tear the hanging cord. 

“I’ll be honest and say a side of me wants to punch you for doing this to your little brother – and I’m not referring to the potion, I’m talking about you snogging him when he was too young as you told me, and don’t think I forgot that truth or dare game back at sixth year where you claimed not to be a virgin, Pads that’s so messed up! – But I guess now there’s nothing to do about it as he’s of age, and I don’t want to lose my best friend again.”

“Aw James, your hesitancy to mark my face warms my heart,” he played, “though you could only wish to touch such handsomeness before meeting my own fists first.” Though maintaining the joyful tone, there was the tense line of a warning underneath. We get to be best friends as long as you don’t cross the line. 

“God, even the threat of a punch can be a turn on to your huge ego,” the Griffyndor replied, tossing a nearby pillow at Sirius.

Sirius responded to the attack by throwing the pillow back. “You know me so well, Prongs.”

“Moony will faint when we tell the news.” James added in a more serious note.

Remus would surely not take the news well, just as James, but he wasn’t particularly prone to point out when he disagreed with something, so Sirius wasn’t particularly worried. Besides, he was terribly easy to make forget any moral qualms if it could be a menace to their friendship. As long as he didn’t give that nerving pity look, which was highly unlikely now as it was the cause of their last row, it was all going to be fine.

“It’ll be fine. Moony complains but he always comes along.”

The ritual had some details Sirius honestly doubted were actually relevant, probably a resquice of a time where wizards believed far more in what they couldn’t see and relied much more on rituals.

But it was unaltered from over a thousand years, and he didn’t spent so many time searching for the flower to just risk everything over finding some things pointless or stupid, tough it was clear the old ways got a big influence on how they were to procede.

First, the bearer was to bathe in red clover, and there was an incantation involved.

Mother, who used to not be particularly involved, decided to make herself useful and made the arrangements for the bath and charmed the water herself. She, just as father, seemed unsure about what to think of the bond, but as all progressed, there was not much to say in protest, and she seemed more wary about public reaction, as a male carrying a child was rarely spoken of and could damage Regulus’s reputation, than her youngest child safety – which was clearly Orion’s worry, judging by all his questions about every minor detail of the potion and the ritual. Or maybe he just wanted to catch signs of failure, Sirius couldn’t be sure.

There was a second incantation involved for the duration of the bath, and Regulus promptly banned anyone but Sirius from doing it.

Then, the parents of the one to carry the child, were to give their blessing by drawing a rune, each to draw one at any desired place of the carrier’s body. Mother and father placed them on Reg’s wrists – Sirius asked about their meaning to the potions master, and apparently it was just old words of a dead dialect that meant acceptance. He was quite sure this was just a smart addition to avoid rebel sons slipping away from their sires control.

True acceptance, though, came after they finished their careful tracing, when father looked up from Regulus’s pale wrists, marked by black paint, to Sirius.

“If you manage to make this work, you shall take Regulus's hand in marriage. I will not bow to your childish menaces of running away, should this not work as planned. If you want to put on a show and part, as you insolently suggested before, feel free to do so, but your brother,” and gestured to a wary Regulus, “Is to remain in the family, where he belongs, and if you dare defy me, I’ll be forced to put you in your place. That is my only condition to grant you my blessing: an heir. Thus, if it does work but generates a female, you shall try again. Ideally, conception would only happen in the sacracy of wedlock, but as circumstances are exceptional, I, as lord Black, ought to concede an exception.”

For the last part – the conception – Sirius had to drop his blood at the potion vial, and give it for Regulus to drink, and his soulmate devoured the blood ties in a petal of life, just like the prophecy said. 

At the sight of the empty vial, he took Regulus's hand and headed to the garden, because the conception was to be illuminated by the light of the full moon. They considered just opening the curtains from his bedroom, but once again Sirius found best to follow the instructions strictly. His window only allowed for partial light; outside was obviously provided a vaster lighting in terms of this particular aspect of the ritual.

A quiet voice was heard beside him, and he turned to see as Regulus charmed the windows that gave view to the yard, paranoid over the possibility of someone catching a view of them. By the uncomfortable looks of Walburga and Orion back at the sitting room, what was about to happen was surely the last view they would wish to see.

Oh well, they would have to get used to the idea.

Regulus’s hold was now growing rigid and tighter, denouncing his apprehension.

Sirius stepped ahead to face him, face the shadow of uncertainty on his features, and took his other hand as well.

“Are you alright?”

“I– I’m scared.” Regulus replied, briefly looking down at his admission. “ I can picture a thousand possibilities of how this could go wrong. Sirius, all this ritual came from a shady potions master, how can you be so calm?” He added, an edge of exasperation in his tone.

“I’m calm because I feel it’s going to work. Call me crazy, but thinking about that day when I passed out, I’m pretty sure it was something... beyond what we know that guided me. I’m not sure how I could explain, but certainly the light I followed was something else. My finger, the place of our first touch, gets warm whenever I’m getting closer, and right now, it’s burning.” The entwine of hands and fingers became undone as Sirius moved his palm to caress a side of Regulus’s face, fondling soft skin with own, feverish in anticipation, watching as his brother leaned a fraction on his hand, letting his skin take in what Sirius just said.

“I feel it too. The day you found the flower, I woke up with a feeling, and my hand was tingling. Although...my hand tingles a lot when I think about you.” Regulus mirrored his actions as he confessed, and upon feeling the touch of a warm hand on his cheek, Sirius felt certainty. “After all this time, I guess it’s worth a try. I still have reservations, but if I really didn’t want it, I would have told you so before you went on a crazy expedition for a plant we didn’t even know for sure existed.”

Sirius took the hand on his face and brought to his lips to kiss the mark of their fate, and that sealed the matter.

They walked past the gazebo, to an open area near some gardenias, and Regulus laid over a blanket Sirius transfigured to something ticker and more comfortable earlier.

Sirius undone the buttons and uncovered Regulus’s skin to glow under natural light, fresh breeze causing a goosebump that prompted him to grab his wand and cast a charm to mild the spring air around them. He took his time to appreciate the visage, took in the details that made Regulus so appealing to him; his soulmate might as well be the moon for that night, his private light.

He leaned down to trail the body he knew well with his mouth, worship the skin he mapped the details of better than his own and breathe confessions, dark and light along a lithe chest, descending between kisses and hot words that promised beyond lifetime-lasting conjunction and unyielding desire. 

He met the core of Regulus’s warmth, gave the lightest kiss on a place that evoked a deep breath of lust, and his soulmate opened up beautifully to him like the ethereal white petals holding the powerful magic of the queen of the night now running inside blue veins, gracious and enchanting.

After Sirius’s hot flesh entered Regulus and they both united, he leaned down to devour wet lips and vulnerability with renewed vehemence, because under the shower of silvery moon glint and the watch of constellations of the night sky, his deepest desire, a charming and feverish dream of belonging and possessing was becoming true. 

He put a stain on his Regulus all those years ago and fell in love with it, marked him, unaware of its power and meaning, and now the last of his soulmate’s hesitancy was turning into new tides to him , for as long as they existed.

As he heard soft cries escaping rounded, puffed lips, Sirius could tell that, deep down, a piece of Regulus had always longed to be his, much before his confession at the graduating dinner, for those were the cries of someone that always craved to belong, just as himself, and now they were turning hidden desire into reality. 

He thrusted into Regulus like a deprived man, but no matter how much he lost himself into lustful impulse, the lilting voice didn’t once denote pain, only want; the stormful, teary eyes didn’t once show regret; the long, thin fingers grabbed his upper arms as if never wanting to let go, digging nails into his fresh until his blood tinted pale skin. The harmonic rhythm of their flesh lasted until, beneath him, the beautiful view of his soulmate becoming undone made him fulfill the last part of the rites. 

Fuck the sacracy of wedding lock, this was sacred on its own way.

The glint of a slow tear escaped by the corner of his soulmate’s eyes, and Sirius took in the taste with a kiss, feeling saltiness and overwhelm against his tongue.

La petite mort had Regulus languorous and sleepy, moving to lay on his side with a small, pleased smile that left an eco even after he closed his eyes; but Sirius was more awake, more alive than ever, mind full of the next events – the charm to confirm there was life growing and the draw of the marriage contract – because his soulmark, and it has yet to fail him, was letting him know it worked.

He picked up and carried his fiancée, sleeping, to his bedroom, to his rightful place, and laid beside him, covering his dreaming form under his arm, to his rightful place.

He could’ve levitated his little one, but he felt the urge to feel Regulus’s lightweight wrapped in soft fabrics, to feel the warmth against him.

Sirius, starting at three years old, lived his life on hold for something greater, the greater diluted in a myriad of other responsibilities, but always attached to the back of his mind, always making him want, always making him work for it. The apex of his work. 

No one could tear them apart now.

Sirius could finally take full responsibility and take care of him; truly have him.

He planted the lightest kiss on the top of dark, soft hair,inhaled his scent in.

Unbeknown to him, Regulus kept his eyes closed as he wondered if this was the right decision, or if he would come to regret his impulses – while he accused his brother of impulsiveness many times, he wasn’t really that far from the same, just hid it better. Sirius could be a little scary sometimes, and he wondered what life would look like when the time came and his soulmate would wear the signet with the family crest and take all the power the position of Lord Black provided, when Regulus wouldn’t have father’s shadow to refrain Sirius.

But what could he have, if not Sirius?

Beside him, his brother finally rested, and Regulus kept speculating for long hours after.

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> The bit where Sirius walks among a path of pomegranate trees is heavily leaning on symbology linked to Hera, goddess patron of childbirth (with some details left open to interpretation).


End file.
